


river deep; mountain high

by bee_kind



Category: Black Panther (2018)
Genre: Black!Reader - Freeform, F/M, dora milaje!reader
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-04-04
Updated: 2018-04-04
Packaged: 2019-04-18 09:00:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,969
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14209707
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bee_kind/pseuds/bee_kind
Summary: from tumblr: "Being one of the Dora Milaje and falling for M'Baku. I hope this is a good prompt, have a good day/night!"(tumblr: @zeusbcrn)





	1. Chapter 1

_I am cursed._

You think as you tramp through the thick of the jungle, pushing wide fern fronds aside and stepping over roots.   
  
_Bast, preserve me, I am cursed._

Scarcely an hour had passed since King T’challa had ascended to the throne and taken his rightful place in the high hall of your people. Right now, he was probably with the priests in the garden of the heart-shaped herb, most sacred place of your people. Right now, he was probably lying in the sand and journeying to the ancestral plane. Right now, the golden city was likely erupting in joy and celebration. ‘Phakade Wakanda!’ the citizens would shout. ‘Wakanda, Forever!’. You should be there celebrating, or guarding or doing what it was you were meant to do, not trekking through the forest with a pack of grim-faced Jabari. A small voice in your head whispered that this was what General Okoye had ordered you to do so it was what you were meant to do, but you tamped it down. The border tribe soldiers could have done this, but they were not asked. In a largely symbolic gesture, you were. It was the river that cut off greater Wakanda from Jabariland and it was to that tribe that you belonged. Had belonged before the age of six, when you were offered up as a Dora Milaje.   
  
You were an elite soldier, trained to protect the throne with your heart, your soul, even your life if need be. You were not meant to be traipsing around the jungle with a known threat to your king, you need to- your foot catches on a root and you lose your footing. You prepare yourself to go down hard, but instead your forehead smacks directly into the firm, warm back of the Jabari’s chief. Your hands come up, pressing against him as you right yourself and try to ignore the way he’s glowering down at you over his shoulder. Your eyes catch his for a moment and the corners of his mouth pull downward in irritation.  
  
“Watch yourself, red one.” He says, the vibrations of his voice through his skin reminding you that you’re still touching. You snatch yourself away and he releases a harsh bark of derisive laughter. “Perhaps the Dora Milaje are not so great as we presumed, if they are afraid to even touch a Jabari.” His men laugh too and you feel heat climbing its way up the back of your neck, flooding your cheeks. You glare at the ground but hold your tongue, diplomacy winning out over your own need to defend yourself.

  
_and Bast curse this great tree-trunk of a man._

The group moves on.

After the Jabari chief had challenged and lost to T’challa, your king had ordered that they be escorted back to their own land by a member of the Dora Milaje. It was a symbolic gesture, one borne of respect. You and your sisters protected kings and M’baku, the great gorilla, pride of his people was nothing if not that in his own right. He had refused at first, but no one could withstand T’challa for long, especially after he’d made it clear that his honor guard would follow one way or another: in the shadows or out. Even now you were sure there were others of you number hiding just out of sight in the treeline, tracking the fifth clan as they made their way home. You alone had been instructed to lead them back toward the mountains and for what reason you did not know. The closest you had come to an answer was that your family were members of the River tribe and you knew the way through the lowlands.  Even still, the Jabari had made their way down the mountain, surely they could find their way back. You sucked your teeth and let your steps slow, falling to the back of the pack. At least if you tripped back here, there’d be no embarrassment and no laughter from ox-headed Jabari chieftains.   
  
M’baku notices you slipping behind and looks ready to let out another  stream of barbs about your incompetence, but his glare falters and his steps do soon afterward. You know he’s about to buckle before the Jabari on either side of him and they shout as he goes down. And just like that the great gorilla of the mountains, is lying face down in river tribe land.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tumblr: @zeusbcrn

No one moves. Half the Jabari stare in shock at the greatest of them lying on the ground unmoving, half stare at you and your eyes flick from M’baku, to the Jabari and back to M’baku. You are the first to speak. 

“Get him up and onto his back. Help me get him to the water.” None of them move. One of them, the Jabari you’d seen M’baku lean on heavily after his feet looks as if he’s preparing to growl something at you, but you beat him to it, head high and voice clear. You were a Dora Milaje, not some cowering child who believed in the fairy tales told about the men around you. “Would you leave your chieftain lying in the dirt like a piece of trash? Get him  _up_  and  _move him to the river’s edge!_ ” This time, your voice left no room for argument. 

It takes three of them using all of their strength to heft the great weight of their leader up and out of the shadow of the trees. When you do make it to the treeline, the moon is already climbing above the mountains in the distance, the sky purple with twilight and dotted with stars. The river glistens and you feel, not for the first time, the familiar longing for home. You have no time for that now. The Jabari carry M’baku forward and set him two meters from the waters edge, where the grass grows long and soft. The light is quickly fading, but there’s still enough of it for you to see that the chieftain’s face is contorted in pain and there are rapidly purpling bruises on his side. You drop to your knees beside him, planting your spear in the soft earth. There is something very wrong with this man.   
  
You hover your hand over the bruises of his side and click your tongue against your teeth in anxiety. There was heat coming off of the area in waves and his breathing was shallow. You placed a hand on the injured area and he inhaled sharply. You snatch it away just as you feel the other Jabari beginning to bristle behind you. You turn to one of them, the one you were sure was his friend and asked: “What did the doctor say?” His jaw tightened.   
  
“We saw no doctor. We have healers of our own and M’baku would not see you spit in the face of Hanuman by using your technology on him.” You sucked your teeth.   
  
“If something is not done, soon he will not be spitting in anyone’s face. You chief has cracked ribs. He is lucky he did not puncture a lung, carrying on as he did.” You place a hand on the large man’s forehead and gently pull back his eyelids. His pupils are wide and unfocused. “-and he has a concussion.” There is nervous murmuring among the Jabari men and you almost wish for Okoye, or Ayo or one of the older, more experienced Dora to appear from the shadows and take this burden from you, but none do. You must act alone. “We cannot move him tonight, he will not make it up the mountain with his ribs unbound.” They give you no argument. You exhale slowly and close your eyes. You were not a medic, had not been trained in anything but the most rudimentary forms of battlefield first aid in order to aid your king until he could be brought back to Wakanda and healed. That would not work here. Even if you could stabilize M’baku with a kimoyo bead, you and his men would have to haul his deadweight through the jungle and back into Birin Zana, the whole of the capital would see him weak and unable to move on his own. It would dishonor him. You would have to fix this on your own.   
  
You squeeze your eyes shut and tried to remember the lessons your grandmother had taught you as a child.  _‘All good things come from the earth Bast has blessed, kipenzi.*’_  she’d said, weathered brown hands tugging at a root just out of sight.  _‘She has given us everything we need.’_  There was a plant that grew in these lands, you knew, with skin riddled with needles and roots that number pain. Your grandmother had given it to you once when you’d scraped your knee. It had been years, but you still remembered it’s name. You look up at one of the Jabari. “Do you know what the pincushion tree looks like?” He gave a curt nod. “It grows in these lands. I need some of it’s roots.” He is gone in a flash, surprisingly quiet. You hang your head and run your eyes over his body. He must have been in great pain, and yet he kept walking, teeth gritted. You shake your head and whisper, “Why did you not tell us?”   
  
“That is not his way.” Another Jabari, the one who seemed to be closest to M’baku, had sunk to his knees on the other side of his leader and was studying him with a furrowed brow. He tuts against his teeth and pats his friend gently on the chest. “It has never been his way. Once when we were children and wrestling on the mountain, he slipped on a patch of ice and went over the side of a cliff. It was a drop of four, maybe five meter and he landed on his shoulder. I heard the bones in his arm break; it was a sound that would turn your stomach. When I got to the edge of the cliff, he was already on his feet, smiling up at me.” There was a far away look in the man’s eyes, you could see it even though he looked down, never once leaving the bruises on his friend’s side, or the gash on his forehead. “I was a mess. I was sure he had died, or was going to, but he just stood there, smiling up at me with blood in his teeth. ‘Do not worry, Bemi!’ he said. ‘I only needed the one arm to beat you anyway!’ can you imagine that?” You couldn’t. The Jabari- Bemi’s mouth turned up into a sad smile. “I was so busy laughing that I almost forgot the state of his arm. He did not even cry out when the healer reset it.” Bemi squeezes M’baku’s shoulder lightly and gives a decided nod of his head. “He will be alright. He’s always been alright.”   
  
He sounds like he needs convincing himself, but you have no choice but to wait for the other Jabari to return with the roots and pray that they help.  _Bast, let him be right._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *kipenzi - dear one


	3. Chapter 3

> The sun had long since disappeared behind the great peaks of the mountains by the time the Jabari you’d sent in search of the pincushion roots returned. While the others had set camp, started a fire and set to roasting something to eat, you and Bemi had watched over M’baku. Bemi had sat at his side while made your way back and forth from the river, filling your canteen and pouring it between the Jabari chieftain’s slack lips. He still had not woken and heat was radiating off of his injuries in waves. You were afraid that if something did not happen and soon he would be consigned to the ancestors. Your hands shook as you pour another swallow into his mouth. 
> 
> Out from the trees, without warning, lopes the Jabari, an entire armfull of pincushion roots clutched to his chest and hands pocked and bleeding. It appeared as if he’d dug them out by hand, so covered in earth was he, or had pushed the trees over himself. You murmur a quick thank you and he nods, plopping down into the earth as you fish through your pack for the bowl and pestle you always packed, a habit your grandmother had instilled in you. ‘Just in case’ she’d always says as she heaped food and tools into your bag before any trip. ‘It is good to be prepared.’ That over-preparation had finally come in handy. You sit, cross-legged and kneed the plant into a paste inside your bowl as quickly as you can manage. The sooner it was done, the quicker the Jabari leader would wake up. You hoped.
> 
> There was no way to be sure; your were no herbalist and certainly no doctor. All you had at your disposal was your grandmother’s anecdotal advice and the faith that Bast would see you through. You close your eyes and start whispering prayers under your breath to the panther goddess, to your ancestors. This had to work; if it didn’t…you don’t allow the thought to reach completion. It would work, You had no choice but to make it. The plant ground into a pulp, you dip your fingers into the bowl and scoop it out. You extend a hand, the eyes of all the Jabari tribesmen present on you, and start smearing the paste over the chieftain’s injuries. He winces once and they bristle, some standing and ready to pull you away from the unconscious man. You snatch your hands back, holding them up in appeasement, but Bemi intercedes for you.   
>   
> “Stop! Can you not see that she is trying to help him?” The senior warrior’s voice seems to force the others into reluctant submission and the sit once more, still watching you with wary suspicion. Bemi nods at you to continue and you murmur your thanks, his approval not stilling the shake in your hands as you continued applying the salve. What would you do if M’baku never woke? Would you be forced to take the blame for his death? Fear clotted your throat and drove you forward. Regardless of your own apprehension, there was work to be done and a Dora Milaje did not flinch from the task at hand. You covered all of his injuries with care and, after checking that you’d coated them all, uncapped your canteen and poured a bit of water in with the remaining paste. The salve would seep into his skin and relieve pain from his injuries, but the medicine you now brewed would break his fever and -you hoped- bring him back to the waking world.   
>   
> The water seeps into the crushed remains of the pincushion plant and you watch as the water changes color, waiting for the moment when it’d be ready to give to the great mountain of a man unconscious beside you. You wait in silence, the eyes of half a dozen Jabari on you, waiting for you to fix the mess you’d all found yourselves in. you closed your eyes and exhaled. Everything would be fine. When you open them once more, the water is a light, clay-ish brown and you lift the bowl, the contents swirling. Bemi watches you intently, awaiting your next move. “Help me lift his head.” You say softly, and the warrior does, sinking to his knees at his leader’s head and lifting the man’s head into his lap. You scoot closer on his other side, lifting the medicine to his lips and pouring it into his mouth with great care.   
>   
> For three horrible seconds, nothing happens.   
>   
> The medicine fills his mouth and dribbles in a thin line out of the corners before you realize that the chieftain isn’t swallowing. You lock eyes with Bemi who is trying his best to suppress a look of concern but isn’t succeeding any more than you are. It is the dark alone that stops his tribesmen from registering your shock. It is lucky, you think for the first time since venturing into the riverlands, it is lucky that you were so far from any city. Had you been closer, had the lights of Birnin Zana shone upon your faces then your fear would have been found out and panic would’ve spread within the ranks. As it was, you were having a hard time stilling the shake in your hands. You set the bowl aside and let your hands fall useless into your lap. If M’baku did not swallow, there was a chance that the medicine you’d rubbed on the outside of his body would still do its work, but it was unlikely. You lean over his body and place your fingers on the soft underside of his jaw in the way your grandmother used to when you were small and wouldn’t swallow the bitter herbs she’d bounded to soothe your sore throat. You rub small circles into his beard, fingers catching slightly as you utter a quick prayer to the ancestors. Your grandmother heard you.  
>   
> M’baku tenses beneath your hands and his lips, slightly parted, close as the medicine slips down his throat. Bemi exhales and gives his leader a solid pat on his chest, but makes no moves to let him lie back on the earth, rapidly cooling now that the sun has disappeared. “You have helped him; you have the thanks of both me and my tribe.” He speaks to you, but his eyes are on the face of his oldest friend, still gone from the world, skin still ashen. “The worst is over, but I fear we have a long night ahead of us yet.” You nod.   
>   
> “Then we will weather it, and keep watch for the sun.”
> 
>  

 


End file.
